color palettes Archives - Page 9 of 9

Avec Style: The 10 Rules of Color Harmony

November 5, 2013 Color is often the first thing to be addressed when fashion and personal style are the subject... The 10 Rules of Color Harmony 1. Limit the number of colors in your outfit to no more than 3. You will in this way create a visual harmony. 2. A print will often include more than 3 colors. In order to create balance, focus on the color which is most prominent in the print when finishing your outfit. Example: A black jacket is a good complement to a dress of multicolored flowers on a black background. 3. To lighten your silhouette, it is preferable to wear lighter/brighter colors on the top half of your body, and darker ones on ... View the Post

Your best color, and a Signature Scarf

Back in the dark ages of the 80's, when I was in graduate school, I worked for a department store. (very un-glamorous, I assure you). This was back when department store inventories were NOT driven by individual "designer" boutiques; we had separate departments for suits, for sportswear, for formal wear etc.

For a while, I worked in the area which sold tee shirts, blouses, shirts and sweaters. We carried at least a dozen styles at any point in time, depending on the season, and each style was available in a couple of dozen "cosmetic" colors. In other words, we always had tops available in every possible shade of coral, peach, plum, pink, berry, cherry, crimson, scarlet or whatever other lipstick-like color you ... View the Post

Pantone Fall Colors, and the Nordstrom Anniversary Sale

July 28, 2013

I might be the last blogger in the world to be mentioning the Nordstrom Anniversary sale, but it's certainly worth mentioning, IF you have a clear idea of what you're planning to purchase for this fall and winter. Nordstrom marks down selected NEW merchandise for a couple of weeks, before returning those items to their regular price in early August. IF, AND ONLY IF, you KNOW what you need and want, this can be a great opportunity. If you just wander in unprepared, you're doomed - everything looks delectable, and you will leave laden with parcels, flat broke, and confused...

I'm going to show you a few things that are currently on sale, and I've chosen them to reflect the colors that Pantone has advised ... View the Post

Considering Colors – 2 more books

February 22, 2013

This first book is chock full of color combinations, with specific references to a variety of adjectives (which you might find appropriate, or laughably odd). Not everything to my taste (NOTHING should ever be exactly to my taste, unless I wrote it myself), but certainly many good ideas, and lots of thought-starters.

Turns out that all three books by Kobayashi are fascinating little volumes, and cover a great deal of the same ground...Remember the 180 words, from which we were requested to choose our favorites and least favorites, that I wrote about back on February 5th? Color Image Scale printed a list of the 30 preferred and disliked words... Clearly, the ... View the Post

More insights from The Colorist

February 12, 2013 While I don't know that any of us are in a position of completely revamping our wardrobes based on the insights from one book, I do think it's interesting to read and study things like this. A greater understanding of one's own preferences and tastes can never truly be wasted...The first exercise in The Colorist (Shigenobu Kobyashi) is to choose 10 colors you like, and five colors you don't like:

Then you find these favorite colors on a full spectrum array, and determine if your color preferences are more for different shades of one color, or for different colors of a particular depth or intensity. Yes, this is impossibly difficult to read... but on my computer, I can "right click" on ... View the Post

Colorist by Shigenobu Kobayashi

Another hard-to-find, but really fascinating book. The author guides one step by step in a process of identifying favorite color palettes. The book has a definite Japanese feel, and once in a while you'll run into a word used in a way you wouldn't have expected (I would guess because it's been translated), but overall it's an eye-opening new way to think about colors. I'll post more from Colorist, because it is out of print and rather expensive to purchase. But if you really like to be challenged in your ways of looking at the world, I recommend this book highly.

Below is the 2nd exercise in the book. You could of course get all deconstructionist about this and start debating what he means when he ... View the Post

Two sides of the whole “color” system question

I was appropriately named (if spelled differently), in that I can see two sides of many issues. And that's certainly the case with the question of having a personal color season, or palette, or other scheme for clothing and personal adornment.

First off, I believe that it's absolutely essential for almost all of us to limit our wardrobe color palette to a manageable 6 to 8 colors. Ideally, I'd think three neutrals and three to five accent colors. This limitation makes it much easier to shop, to coordinate garments and accessories, and to have those serendipitous moments when (this happened to me this morning) your can reach into your closet and grab a scarf that exactly matches the stripe in the argyle of your sweater. ... View the Post

Considering colors: a site to savor

Many people struggle with the idea of building a wardrobe in a limited color palette, so I've been nosing about, finding some interesting websites which help train one's eye, and evaluate gut reactions, where colors are concerned.

One of my favorites can be found here; it's a site on which you can upload a favorite photograph, and then build a color palette based on the colors detected in that photograph. For example, I have always admired Canada geese - they wear the same monochromatic palette every day, but are always the most elegant birds in the city. Coupled with the stunning photograph above, I knew that I might learn something interesting about my personal color preferences by using the Image to Palette tool.

So ... View the Post

Transitioning from one color palette to another – part 2

brown tee – Debenhams, brown jeans – InWear, snake print tote – Jimmy Choo, safari scarf – Generalpants.com.au, loafers – Dolce Vita

Camel jacket – Nordstrom, orange coat – Burberry Prorsum, gold jacket – Sonia Rykiel, yellow peacoat – Old Navy, tan peacoat – Victoria’s Secret, faux leopard trim coat – Miss Selfridge, orange hoodie – Jil Sander, olive coat – Rag & Bone

Green dress – Alice and Olivia, rust dress – Viktor & Rolf, orange dress – 3.1 Phillip Lim, camel dress – Dorothy Perkins, brown sandals – Tod’s, cognac sandals – Pied a Terre, gold sandals – Prada, tan sandals – Sam Edelman ... View the Post

Transitioning from one color palette to another – some ideas

Camel pleated skirt – Oasis, tan jeans – CLOSED, brown skirt – Marc by Marc Jacobs, ivory skirt - Mulberry ... View the Post

When image consultants collide

May 30, 2011

Way back in the early years of image consulting, circa 1981 or so, I had my colors "done". I was working in a large department store as a department manager, and it was felt that management staff should all be exposed to the services of our personal shopper and consultant group, in order to help their business. To nobody's surprise (except maybe my mother), I am a Winter:

This was reassuring, as I was already building a wardrobe of gray suits, white blouses, and brightly colored scarf accents. (does anybody else remember Dress for Success?) One of the coolest lingering pieces of advice, which I'm going to discuss at more length some day, was the advice to buy tee ... View the Post